And You Thought You Looked Stupid Playing Kinect Adventures?

Let me start off with this spoiler alert… I love this game. If you really care about my opinion keep going but if nothing else shut off your computer and go buy this game. With that said, if you enjoy looking like an idiot in all the other Kinect games, this one is the worst of them all. Imagine Dance Dance Revolution, but with better songs and actual dance moves.

I am the current reigning champion of Lady GaGa’s Poker Face, Having amassed 5 stars and almost a million points on hard difficulty. By reigning champion I mean between the 5 people on my friends list that have a Kinect. The game is really good at helping you out by first breaking down each move slowly and making you repeat it correctly 3 times because the human brain has to see hear or do something 3 times to get it. (Thank you Psych 241) Easy is the only level you can complete without doing this training.

As I do with every game I start on Easy to get acquainted with the controls and get familiar with scoring. Starting the “Break It Down” training I learn the few basic moves, sliding then clapping is the mainstay of Lady GaGa. What turns out is my Achilles Heel is the Blazer Step; I still can never get it quite right after a solid 30 times. Easy gets knocked out no problem with only 6 simple moves, and over a little too quick. In the middle of this, what might be considered a break you get to “Freestyle.” Freestyle is where Kinect does what it knows best and take a bunch of time-lapse pictures to make you look like a goofy idiot. Time to kick it up to Medium! Medium is better but still a little too easy to dance through. Second time through this song but at least it’s not terrible. Freestyle I look even dumber if possible. Now it’s time to kick Dance Central up to 11 and Break It Down on Hard.

Hard adds a whole bunch more moves that contain exciting to watch rhythmic flailing. Hard is finally worth considering this a real dance! This level is where you might actually be able to use moves in public if you ever wanted to dance. Miraculously I somehow manage 450,000 points for at the time the record for my friends list. I should point out I have no females on my list so this is an achievement in and of itself, 5 guys in their 30’s competitively dancing against each other. This original score turned out to be some kind of Mt Everest for my friends, not able to get over the 400K mark.

Going through a few other songs it’s all new dance but nothing quite like the excitement of your first run through of Poker Face. Score wise, nothing spectacular here; we’re all within a few thousand points of each other on the songs. These are all your typical dance club beats ranging from 70’s disco to the hip hop (quite literally!) of today. Turns out that a bunch of 30yr olds aren't that graceful and moves start including more jumping which makes the scores for everyone drop But what about multi-player you say?

Right about now it’s Christmas time in Colorado and the annual party turns in to a throw down. Imagine if you will a peaceful Christmas, gifts exchanged and board games for all. That lasted for about 20 minutes until a verbal gauntlet gets tossed to the ground. To the basement marches a line of what only a few minutes ago were friends talking in museum level soft spoken voices. Sweaters and collared shirts give way to t-shirts. Heels, boots, and a very stylish pair of Sketchers (If I do say so myself) are in a big pile and about a dozen people stand there in socks watching the Kinect start up.

Everyone seems to take a warm up dance of you guessed it… Lady GaGa’s Poker Face. I lie in wait, watching my competition Blazer Step, and finally the party notices I haven’t moved or spoken. In what feels like a ninja style leap I’m on my feet and ready to dance. Warm up Lady GaGa, I beat my score and hit above 500,000 on just the practice. “Dude you just got half a million points!” Jedi Swayze shouts from the back.

Now no more of this single player practice! 2 men enter, 1 man leaves… DANCE OFF!!!!! Both people dance the same dance, alternating back and forth mid song to make this a true competition and not just 2 people playing single player again. This dance off against the aforementioned Jedi Swayze I increase my score yet again, at almost 700,000 points. If you remember previously I have almost doubled my own top score at this point. Jedi however has now increased his score to over 600,000, nipping right at my heels. Time to stop playing around, I go all out, put it all on the line and save nothing for later. The now 17th time I have heard Lady GaGa in one night I pull 819,000. But it is not my hard drive!

Now a month later, Jedi has yet to beat my score on his system and his new motto is “It just stares me in the face laughing at me, because I know it’s not mine.” You need this game if only to try and beat my score.


That’s how this gamer sees it
-Pimpnelli

Adventures Beyond Belief!

Normally whenever you get something for “free with purchase” it’s not worth the space it takes up. Video games however have always been the exception. Nintendo started off with Super Mario and Duck Hunt, which to this day is still one of the best games of all time. Then all of a sudden when the fifth generation systems (Like Sony’s first ever try in consoles Playstation) came out, pack in games were no more. Maybe it was greed by the console companies, maybe it was that we were willing to pay for it anyway, but the world may never know. Then Nintendo changes the rules back and bundles Wii Sports, still one of the consoles most popular games. PS Move comes with a bunch of demos and Kinect comes with Kinect Adventures.

At first glance Adventures seems like a bunch of childish mini-games with no depth making you jump and lean like the typical motion games. Come to find out that’s just level one. Increasingly difficult levels make you jump, lean, twist, turn, kneel, bend, and basically contort yourself to every position possible.

Your first game is Rally Ball, and you’re using your body to bounce balls against a big wall. Imagine a top down view of Breakout, except you’re the little strait line. Power-ups include
Your second game is called River Rush, alone or with the help of a friend your goal is to pilot an inflatable raft down the longest series of rapids ever made. Leaning left and right you steer your surprisingly responsive raft trying to capture coins and taking the occasional photo. Once you’ve mastered the 30 seconds of leaning it’s time to jump over rocks shaped ramps. No big deal so far, I can handle some leaning and jumping.

Now comes the hardest mini-game, Reflex Ridge. Your wooden platform roller coaster goes up and down a series of gates forcing you to jump, duck, and stretch out in what seems like demonic insane yoga positions. Right now it’s become fairly obvious that not only am I incredibly out of shape, my flexibility is poor at best.

Now incredibly out of breath my Xbox suggests I take a break, so I take the few minutes of mercy from my cruel master. My favorite mini-game 20,000 leaks is up. The basic premise of this is you’re in a glass box underwater and fish are attacking your not that thick glass. Using your hands and feet you have to cover up the holes for 3 seconds any way you can. It sounds dumb and looking at the pictures in the end it looks even dumber.

Now is a good time to bring up the pictures for Kinect. Every game takes pictures or videos of you doing stupid moves and decides to create a caption for it. I have had such awesome captions as “Dancing Queen” and “Look Ma’ I Can Fly!” This feature is great if you have no modesty in your gaming experience. And hopefully alone.

The last and my least favorite game is Space Pop. In Space Pop, transparent balls (soap bubbles) shuttle between holes on the walls, floors and ceilings of a virtual zero-gravity room. The player attempts to pop the bubbles by touching them to earn Adventure pins. Space Pop utilizes depth, requiring the player to move toward and away from the sensor. To move upwards, the player can flap his or her arms, and to stay at current height, hold arms out to the sides. In a small room like mine that barely fits the minimum requirements it’s just too much going on for me to run forward, back and side to side. I feel that since it comes with the Kinect it’s pointless to recommend it but if I had to purchase it, it would be worth buying.

And that’s how this gamer sees it.
-Pimpnelli

Back in the Trenches.

The newest member to the Call of Duty franchise has continued to add something new to a series that could easily have had success by just putting a new coat of paint on it. I was a huge Call of Duty 4 : Modern Warfare 1 and 2 fan and was skeptical that the series could be made any better. I was disappointed by Call of Duty: World at War as I felt it strayed a little too far from what I loved about Modern Warfare.

With Call of Duty: Black Ops what stood out from the start was the progression through multi-player classes. You now purchase your guns, attachments, kill streaks and everything in between with COD Points that you earn through online play. This appealed to me as I have always chosen a sniper class but would like to deviate and enjoy other classes without fully dedicating my game play to that class just to open better weapons and attachments. With Black Ops they have solved this dilemma by allowing you to use your points towards whatever guns and attachments you choose. Just the same as in previous COD titles certain guns are unlocked as you climb in the ranks but having all attachments open from the beginning have seems to leveled the playing field for online play. By being able to modify your weapons to your liking from the start without having to traverse a maze of challenges definitely allows even the novice player an enjoyable online experience. Small additions like being able to create your own custom player card, etch your clan tag on your gun and choosing from a variety of face paints add even more luster to an already solid title.

Two great new modes added to multi-player are Wager Matches and Combat training. In Wager Matches you take your hard earned COD Points and put them up against other players in a series of less conventional matches. This breaks up the monotony of the normal death match or domination matches. The Wager Matches consist of: "One in the Chamber" - Players start with a pistol with only one bullet and three lives. Killing another player allows them to steal their bullet; "Sticks and Stones" - Players are armed with a crossbow, knives and a tomahawk. Getting killed with a tomahawk throw will bankrupt the scalped player; "Gun Game" - A progressive multi-player mode where players start off with a pistol and progress through the subsequent weapons with each kill. The first player to go through every weapon wins; "Sharp Shooter" - All players start with the same randomly selected weapon. The available weapons will cycle after a fixed amount of time. The top 3 players win a share the anted points. All of the modes provide an "on the edge of your seat" excitement that is sometimes lost in other matches since you actually have something to lose. All Wager Matches feature a unique experience that does not seem to dilute through continued play. The best new mode added I believe was Combat Training. This allows novice and experienced players alike to take on AI bots in a Team Death Match. For novice players this gives them an opportunity to learn the game, weapons and basic tactics. I have seen this the most helpful with my friend Uranater who was not big into the genre due to always feeling he was just target practice for more experienced players. Since putting in considerable time in Combat Training he just "Prestiged" for the 2nd time and is top in points in almost every match he plays.

This narrowing of the gap between causal and hard core gamers has really increased the appeal to all types of players. For Experienced players this gives them a chance to learn maps, angles and also work on team work as you can take part in these matches with friends. Although this mode does not let you gain XP or COD Points that can be used towards your progression it does provide an invaluable prospect to all players to be able enjoy their online experience. Overall Black Ops has taken a great franchise, added even more excitement and depth, again proving why COD is a consistent leader in this genre. On top of great maps that provide a great contrast offering greater elevation changes, heart pounding close quarter combat and crisp graphics. Black Ops offers a pick up and play experience that no other current shooter offers. This hands down is a must have for any gamer. I give this game 5 out of 5, 2 thumbs up, or any other scale you want, but really just buy it.

That's how this gamer sees it.
-CBU

The random named tiger

My first game I decided to test is the ridiculously heartwarming sickeningly sweet game Kinectimals. Let me first add my intention of buying this was solely to entertain my 3 year old niece. I swear!

The only easy thing about this game from moment 1 is hitting the close tray button to turn it on. Purchasing one of the collector’s editions with the plush Maltese Tiger I start off trying to scan my little tag to get him in game. This proves extremely difficult as the controls of this game are awful.  Swiping through menus is slow and if you go too fast it freaks out and just stops.  Incidentally, I don’t know what a Maltese Tiger really looks like but my guess is it’s not powder blue like this one in the box, but it’s still cute.

After the debacle of getting in to the game I am staring at this little cub, and he (at least I assume a he) is looking back at me with puppy dog eyes. Now a magical flying little rat shows up to be my guide through this journey.  He proceeds to tell me some story about how the animals all live on this island alone waiting for some guy to come back. Finally we get to a point where I actually do something, name the blue thing.

My initial name tries were rejected until a random name finally stuck, which turns out is meaningless. , which turns out is meaningless. 20 minutes in to the game now and I finally get some kind of interaction with my pet. I will leave out the long boring mini game details but the basics are throwing things that they may or may not bring back, phantom driving things in circles, and using a magnifying glass to find buried stuff that they won’t ever dig up. You can however teach him tricks with hand signals and voice commands, but they will only work during the specific missions. Maybe if I finished all the missions it would have opened up the world more but I just could not suffer through it anymore.

Eventually I tried switching the sensor from the bottom of the tv to the top which made it a little easier to use but, in the end Kinectimals is a great idea that fell way short of what it could have been. Suffering from poor controls and too linear of a storyline, I would recommend renting or maybe even passing on this one all together.

That's how this gamer sees it.
-Pimpnelli

The new toy

After a few days playing with Kinect I have decided to finally give some insight on Microsoft and motion control.

The setup at first glance seemed easy to do, plug it in, turn on your system, and put in the included game/setup drivers. I put it under my tv like all my other sensors have gone. Kinect does this almost scary initial scan looking me up and down, almost like leering at me. Then the fine tuning begins with every setting possible having its own menu. After the initial scan you move on to the audio. First you set up the microphone and your typical background noise check and say your listed nonsensical phrase, nothing new here. Kinect having already looked at my living room starts listening to itself and making these musical tones out of various speakers to find where the walls are. A little more interesting than a normal setup now.

Finally we reach the Kinect ID phase, which was one of the coolest and creepiest features listed. A little grid comes up with a picture of my avatar. This is where I must admit I do not have a Kinect friendly playspace, it’s not enough distance from my tv to me so I can already see something not working right. After about 10 tries to set up this I give up and just move on to actually do something.

I make it to the Kinect Hub which is a much simpler and basic version of the menu and I go through this mini tutorial on what does something. I start trying to move things with gestures, slowing down until Kinect and I decide what speed will work for us both. It’s like any good relationship, we need to compromise. Menus start getting easier to navigate and I’m learning what to do. Now I start testing the voice functionality. “XBOX… ESPN” my new go to phrase as it turns out in a bit, comes up immediately. I’m a pro at this having navigated my first menu and told my xbox what to do. A stroke of luck, I have some friends on who have just bought their Kinect too, time to do some more testing! We have come to my first problem with my new toy. Yes we can chat with each other but it sounds like we’re on speakerphone halfway across the room, so it works but not usably.

Cut to the next day, house to myself every item in my living room moved to make this the best playspace I can. I start to try this Kinect ID thing again with the same results. Finally a stroke of genius as I invent a way to get every inch possible away from this thing. Pushing tables aside, crawling and leaning awkwardly around other furniture, my scan ballet completes. After several hours over 2 days… success!!

P.S. Eventually I figure out the top of my tv works better than the bottom, but that did not significantly affect the performance of the Kinect Hub.

That's how this gamer sees it.
-Pimpnelli

A Brief Moment in Time... For Motion

Finally Kinect is just a few days away. The excitement has been building for almost a year between all the press events and trailers, and coming down to the wire I wonder what does Kinect offer that the Wii and PS Move don’t already have weeks, months, and years sooner.  Before the Wii came along, I was one of the 5 people who bought the Eye Toy for the PS One. It was slow to react and only sensed wide grandiose gestures like an old world Italian family arguing. Flash forward to the Eye Toy 2, a little better but still absolute crap. The big failure was for both the Eye Toys was they had all of 3 games, and they were all the same. After those huge flops in motion control Sony flat out said motion is a gimmick and real gamers would never use it.  Cut to 2006…

September, Microsoft unveils the Xbox Live Vision, which turns out to be for all intensive purpose the Eye Toy 3. With the addition of the same 3 Eye Toy games and the ability to video chat to one of the other 10 people on Xbox Live who bought it or even play Texas Hold’Em or Uno to watch if someone is bluffing. I used it twice, once to take a new profile picture and once on a game to make sure it worked.

November, The Wii shows up and Nintendo changes what the world considers a game. With the first free game included in a system since Mario, Wii Sports is still one of the most popular games on the system. Sales of Wii skyrocket and people from 10-100 scramble to get their hands on it. I myself even made up an elaborate story about a fictional wife making me sleep on the couch until I die if I forgot to get it for my fictional son’s birthday. Luckily after calling every retailer I could think of it worked on some poor pathetic Blank’s Blank employee.  Sony and Microsoft after the huge failures of motion control write off Wii and go about their business models like it doesn’t exist until they lose billions in revenue. Cut to 2010…

Sony brings out the PS Move in what could be the most underwhelming media blitz ever, I didn’t know it had even come out until I saw it in a weekly ad. Sony’s all but forgotten the merciless attacks on the Wii and now has a controller that looks exactly like the Wiimote but with a cute colored globe on top. The first thing Sony has going for the PS Move is the fact that Sony fanboys are loyal to the grave. The final thing, the better control gives it the ability to be used in real games and is even launching with a top shelf exclusive first person shooter under its belt.

Finally at long last the history lesson is over and we’re 3 and a half days from Kinect. Their tag lines are many but I personally liked “Who would have thought you would grow up to be a controller.” Kinect allows you to voice control your Xbox, and every aspect of Xbox can be controlled by motion. Besides the obvious cool factor of your Xbox now the closest you will get to living out your Minority Report fantasies, It also has a kind of Skynet always watching you vibe to it. I will reserve judgment until the day it comes out, but I for one am excited to be a controller instead of just throwing one.

That's how this gamer sees it.

-Pimpnelli